Rexanne Becnel (27 page)
Authors: The Knight of Rosecliffe
Rhonwen felt light. Lighter than the air. She floated along, buffeted by a difficult wind, blown up into the rugged hills, then down into the damp valleys. The forest brimmed with life, green and vibrant, then, without warning, turned gray and barren. The sky brightened and the sun heated her skin. Then the sun faded and a terrible twilight consumed the land.
She whimpered, searching for the light and the verdant spring hills she loved. But the wind had her and would not let her go. Faces came and went, looming huge, then dwindling away. But one face lurked just beyond the lines of her sight. A familiar face, old and reassuring.
Newlin floated on the wind, impervious to is buffeting, and, encouraged, she tried to reach him.
Help me. Help me
, she pleaded, and he reached out in response. But she couldn’t quite reach him. She couldn’t quite reach him … .
, she pleaded, and he reached out in response. But she couldn’t quite reach him. She couldn’t quite reach him … .
Thunder shook her partially awake and she looked up into a brilliant light. Heaven? She passed just as quickly into shadows, beneath a towering gate. Heaven’s gates? she again wondered. If that was so, she should find peace. But Newlin wouldn’t let her … .
“She tried to speak,” Rhys told Jasper when they halted inside the bailey at Rosecliffe Castle. “She begged for help.”
The boy was visibly distraught, and that shook Jasper’s hard-fought calm.
The boy was visibly distraught, and that shook Jasper’s hard-fought calm.
They’d ridden as hard as they could, under the circumstances. Now, inside Rosecliffe’s heavily fortified walls, the young Welsh rebel’s eyes darted swiftly about. His few men had followed their leader beneath the massive steel-strapped gate. They bunched around him now, a ragtag band, pitifully outnumbered.
To take them captive would be an easy task. But imprisoning Rhys was the last thing on Jasper’s mind. He stared at the woman so limp in Rhys’s arms, so small and pale, and all he could think of was Rhonwen.
Rhonwen.
He flung himself down from Helios and threw the reins to a startled lad. As the castle folk ceased their labors and drew near, he barked orders.
“Call my lady Josselyn. Prepare a sickbed. Send for the village healer.” He stopped beside the still-mounted Rhys, and his heart pounded with fear. But he took a steadying breath. “Hand her down to me.”
“She begged for help,” Rhys repeated in a stricken voice. “Her eyes opened, but I don’t think she knew me,” he added in less than a whisper.
“Give her to me,” Jasper repeated.
Rhys’s expression hardened when he looked down at Jasper. “It is a measure of my love for her that I have brought her here. I want her to live. I need her to live—” He broke off and took a harsh breath. “But if she does not live … ’tis you I will hold at fault.”
Jasper met his menacing stare without flinching. “If Rhonwen dies I will hold myself responsible,” he swore, though his even voice belied the intensity of his emotions. “Give her to me. You have the freedom to stay or leave. No one here will harm you or prevent your free passage.”
Slowly Rhys lowered Rhonwen’s limp form. He did not want to release her to Jasper. That was plain. Jasper looked down at the woman in his arms and fought down a crushing wave of panic. She was so pale.
Around them people whispered, for they’d recognized Rhonwen—and Rhys. Two serving women led the way as Jasper strode toward the keep. As he mounted the steps two at a time, Josselyn rushed out.
“Jasper! Dear God, but we were so worried.” Then she spied Rhonwen and she blanched. “Is she—”
“She is alive. But barely.”
“The healer is on his way, milady.” One of the maids pointed at a man hurrying toward them. “The old one, Newlin, awaits you in the hall.”
Newlin! Rightly or wrongly, Jasper took heart from the bard’s presence.
Josselyn paused, looking back toward the gate. “Could it be? But no. Is that Rhys?”
“It is. Some of his men are hurt. Could you see to them?”
Rhys watched as Jasper disappeared into the stout stone keep. Though consumed with doubt, he still clung to hope. She must live. She must!
A woman watched him from across the yard. Josselyn. He’d seen her but briefly when Jasper had held him captive. Now he studied her closer.
She’d changed little since she’d wed the Englishman. She was three times a mother—and no doubt despised him for taking her firstborn hostage. When she descended the steps and made her way toward him, he braced himself for her scorn. It was no matter to him what she thought. He’d long held her in contempt for taking an Englishman to her bed.
She stopped directly in front of him. The horse he rode stamped and tossed its head, and Rhys had to force himself to relax his tight grip on the leather reins.
“Rhys.” She nodded her head in greeting.
He nodded in response. “You will attend Rhonwen? You will oversee every aspect of her recovery?” His voice was harsher than he’d intended.
“I will. What of you and your men? Jasper tells me there are wounded—”
“We can tend our own.”
She sighed, then placed her fists on her hips and cocked her
head. “As you wish. I will tell the cook to bring ale and victuals.”
head. “As you wish. I will tell the cook to bring ale and victuals.”
“We will not stay.”
“There is nothing to fear—” she began.
“And nothing here that I fear,” he snapped. “Nothing save Rhonwen’s injuries.”
“Then stay. Stay and rest and sup with us.”
She looked up at him without rancor. Her garb was the simple fitted tunic and kirtle of a Welshwoman. But the tunic was made of a pale blue caddis, a finer weave than was common, with ornate cording at the wrist and back. Still, her head was uncovered and her long braids were familiar.
She’d looked much the same when she’d arrived in Afon Bryn so many years ago. So long ago it was, but he remembered. His own father had wanted her. He understood that now. But his grandfather had been the one to wed her. Meanwhile, it had been Randulf FitzHugh’s child she’d borne.
Despite his distrust of her back then, he’d been a motherless little boy and so had been inextricably drawn to her. To her warmth and her beauty. To the mothering qualities she’d wanted to shower upon him.
Now, almost ten years later, he could feel her working those same wiles upon him. A part of him wanted to accept her invitation, to let her minister to him and to his sore and weary men. How many women had ever sought to give him comfort, beyond the brief use of their bodies? None since his mother, and he remembered very little of her.
Then he reminded himself that Josselyn was his enemy and not to be trusted. But his stomach growled, and his ever-present hunger raised a clamor. “We have a need for food,” he muttered. Why should he not sate himself on English stores? Why not take whatever he could from them? They’d taken enough from him.
“Very well.” She gestured to a wide stone building abutting the fortified keep. At just that moment three children burst through the doors of the keep. A boy, followed by two girls, one of whom Rhys recognized.
She recognized him too, for she skidded to a halt, then
dragged her younger sister back toward the shelter of the doors. “Mama, Mama! Look out! ’Tis him—Rhys ap Owain. The outlaw!”
dragged her younger sister back toward the shelter of the doors. “Mama, Mama! Look out! ’Tis him—Rhys ap Owain. The outlaw!”
The boy hesitated only a moment, then dashed toward his mother as if to protect her.
Josselyn turned to her children. “’Tis all right, Isolde. He has brought Rhonwen back to us. She’s hurt.”
The girl glared at him. Though she was a slight little thing and delicate in her features, her lowered brows and downturned mouth made no secret of her hatred of him. “Did he do it?” she cried in an accusing voice. “Is he the one that hurt her?”
Rhys stiffened. Though he allowed that she was entitled to her distrust of him, he was not inclined to suffer the invective of a child. Drawing on his reins, he backed his mount away from Josselyn. “Send word of Rhonwen’s condition to your aunt in Carreg Du,” he snarled at her. “Most especially I will want to know when she is strong enough to return home.”
“Wait, Rhys. Don’t leave!” she begged.
But he ignored her plea. He whirled his horse so sharply that it reared in alarm. But the sturdy beast swiftly regained its footing and, with little urging, it scattered the crowd and thundered across the bridge and into the harsh emptiness of the Welsh countryside. He drove the animal to the limits of its endurance and his men strung out in a line behind him.
But Rhys could not outrun his memories of the past. Nor his fear of the future.
Jasper hovered outside the door, straining for any sound from the chamber where Rhonwen lay. But there was none. No sound pierced the muffled silence of the thick stone walls and the heavy paneled door.
He exhaled harshly, then scrubbed his hands across his face. He was filthy and exhausted, and splattered with blood—both his own and that of others. Lowering his hands, he stared at them. Were any of the dark rust-colored bloodstains that creased his knuckles from Rhonwen?
He shuddered and felt an unaccustomed ache in his chest,
as if his entire body were caving in on itself, disappearing into the hole where his heart used to be. He pressed one fist to his chest. God in heaven. Did he love her?
as if his entire body were caving in on itself, disappearing into the hole where his heart used to be. He pressed one fist to his chest. God in heaven. Did he love her?
The pain in his chest grew worse. He could hardly breathe for it. He leaned stiff-armed against the wall, afraid he might collapse.
He loved her.
He loved her, and in his selfish need to possess her, he’d nearly caused her death. She might yet die.
He squeezed his eyes shut, horrified by his own selfishness. He’d had to have her, and so he’d pursued her long past the time when he should have simply accepted that she did not want him. And now, because of his stubbornness and his overweening pride, she lay near death.
It didn’t help that he’d slain LaMonthe. It didn’t matter that he’d bullied Rhys into bringing her here. If she died …
He cringed, unable to contemplate such a thing. He couldn’t let himself think about the possibility of her dying. She might yet live. The healer had a well-known talent, and Josselyn would do everything she could. And if his prayers meant anything at all, she might yet live.
And if she did … if she did, he must let her go. He must give her back the life she wanted. Even if Rhys were not her lover, he was someone she did love. She’d been running back to Rhys when Jasper had caught her.
He stared blindly at the cold gray wall, seeing instead the coldness of his life and the gray sameness of his future. Empty. No love. No joy.
No Rhonwen.
When the door hinge creaked, he jerked in alarm. Isolde slipped out, then closed the heavy door behind her. Her young face was pale and worried, but she spoke with a maturity he’d not previously seen in her.
“Mama says if you will clean yourself you may come in to see Rhonwen when she and Romney are finished.”
“How is she?” His voice was a hoarse croak.
Isolde frowned. “She is weak. Romney wanted to bleed her, but Mama said no. She’d already lost enough blood. So they
cleaned her wound and stitched it closed.” Her face puckered in a grimace. “It was a dreadful cut in her side, Jasper. I could see her entrails.” She stared solemnly at him. “I never saw anyone get stitched before.”
cleaned her wound and stitched it closed.” Her face puckered in a grimace. “It was a dreadful cut in her side, Jasper. I could see her entrails.” She stared solemnly at him. “I never saw anyone get stitched before.”
Jasper swallowed hard and fought down a wave of nausea. He couldn’t bear this! “Will she live?” He caught Isolde by the shoulders and crouched down so that they were face-to-face. “Will she live?”
Tears started in the child’s eyes. “I hope she will. I …” Her voice caught on a sob and she looked away. “This is all my fault, isn’t it?”
“Your fault?” With a finger beneath her chin he tilted her face up to his. “Isolde, why would you think this is your fault?”
“Because … because I followed her and got caught, and then you followed her and caught Rhys, and then she … she traded us for him and … and he hated you and you had her and then … and then she got away and you followed her and … and then she got stabbed!” She began to cry, huge sobs that shook her slender little frame.
“No, sweetheart.” He hugged her close and rubbed her back. “No, Isolde. This is not your doing. None of it.”
“But …” She shuddered with the force of her misery. “But I wanted her to die. In the beginning … I prayed to God that she would die. But I changed my mind, only now … now she really might die.”
“Listen to me, love. You had nothing to do with what happened to Rhonwen. Nothing.” He held her, murmuring reassurances as the storm of her tears slowly wore itself out. When she was finally only hiccuping into his damp shoulder, he held her slightly away from him. “Better?”
She shrugged, averting her unhappy face. “You should never pray for someone to die,” she said in a small voice.
“Probably not. But I doubt God is impressed by such prayers. Why did you want her to die?”
Her lower lip trembled. “First … first I just wanted her to go away because … because I knew you liked her.”
“And then?” he prompted when she hesitated.
“Then when she and Rhys made me into a hostage, I … I prayed to God that they would both die. And all their men, too.”
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